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KSDE Guidelines for 8th Grade Technology Literacy Assessment
(9-26-06)

Enhancing Education Through Technology Requirement
NCLB, Title II, D Goal 2-A
To assist every student in crossing the digital divide by ensuring that every student is technologically literate by the time the student finishes the eighth grade, regardless of the student’s race, ethnicity, gender, family income, geographic location, or disability.

SETDA Definition
Technology literacy is the ability to responsibly use appropriate technology to communicate, solve problems, and access, manage, integrate, evaluate, and create information to improve learning in all subject areas and to acquire lifelong knowledge and skills in the 21st century.

Recommended Curriculum
KSDE developed state technology standards (located with in the Kansas Model Curricular Standards for Library Media & Technology) in 2006 based primarily on the NETS for Students. It is recommended that districts use this document as the primary resource and adapt it for developing benchmarks, indicators, and instructional activities at each grade at the local level.

Assessment Methods
The method of assessment used is determined at the local level. The assessment method can be:

• knowledge based (test)
• grades in a required 8th grade course
• performance based (checklist/rubric)
• e-portfolio based (collected over a period of years)
• project based
• combination of any of the above

These assessment methods can be used with each standard individually or clustered where it is appropriate. They can be done in content areas or they can be done as a stand-alone effort.

Reporting Requirements
Districts report technology literacy results on the Local Consolidated Plan Annual Report due July 1, 2007. The report requires the following information:

1. Provide number of 8th graders evaluated in each district for technology literacy at the end of 8th grade. Report the number found technologically proficient and number found not technologically proficient.
2. Check off the type of assessment method used.

Resources
1. http://virtualksde.com/ includes a three-part podcast in the KSDE Cast section on the Draft 8th Grade Technology Literacy Assessment. This podcast can be used to explain the assessment process. Although the title says “draft” the information presented is accurate.
2. Draft Kansas Model Curricular Standards for Library Media & Technology will be posted on the KSDE website in late October. They can be used to assist in determining which standards to include in the 8th Grade Technology Literacy Assessment.

3. Dr. Mirah Dow from the School of Library and Information Management at Emporia State University has developed an Information and Technology Assessment. There are three forms:
o 8th Grade Information & Technology Literacy Product/Project Contract
o Information and Technology Evaluation Rubric
o Annual Analysis of 8th Grade Students Information and Technology Literacy Form
Dr. Dow’s resources are located at: http://slim.emporia.edu/kschool/home.htm
4. ISTE has collaborated with Microsoft in the development of the NETS Online Technology Assessment to help teachers measure student skills in using software applications and help measure student progress toward meeting the National Educational Technology Standards for Students (NETS•S). These formative assessment resources were developed to help support educators of middle school students as they worked towards the 8th grade technology literacy requirement. http://www.iste.org/resources/asmt/msiste
5. The Technology Literacy Proficiency Checklist for K–8 students was developed in response to a request from the state members of the North Central Regional Technology in Education Consortium (NCRTEC) at Learning Point Associates, founded as the North Central Regional Educational Laboratory (NCREL). This checklist is linked from the Iowa DOE, Keystone AEA Technology Services website at: http://www.aea8.k12.ia.us/documents/u_031404213821.pdf
6. Project-Based assessment resources from the George Lucas Educational Foundation Assessment Resources http://www.edutopia.org/modules/Assessment/index.php
7. Project-Based resources through the TechYES Program at: http://genyes.com/programs/techyes/
8. ISTE Student NETS Technology Standards at: http://cnets.iste.org/index.shtml
9. 21st Century Skills documentation at: http://www.21stcenturyskills.org/
10. 21st Century Skills Audit Tool, developed by Sioux Falls School District in South Dakota http://workshop.altec.org/TRCeval/documents/21skills.doc
11. Tools Measuring Technology Implementation in the Classroom: Levels of Technology Implementation (LoTi ) http://www.loticonnection.com/
12. Online Rubrics and Rubric Tools: RubiStar www.altec.org
13. Online Surveys and Survey Tools:
o ProfilerPro - http://profilerpro.com/
o Survey Monkey - http://surveymonkey.com/
o Zoomerang - http://info.zoomerang.com/
14. Michigan State Department of Education has a checklist using teacher observation, portfolio evidence, formal assessment and technology literacy class as an assessment method. http://www.techplan.org/supresources.html or http://www.techplan.org/METS2005Checklist.doc

For Additional Information Contact

Library Media Specialists make inquiries to Dr. Jackie Lakin at jlakin@ksde.org

Curriculum Coordinators & Technology Coordinators make inquiries to Melinda Stanley at mstanley@ksde.org

Dissiong of topics for Next 4 Months
Past suggestions include GPS, Inspire Data Demo, Handhelds/ipods/Neos, Assistive Technology, Shared Spreadsheets and Writing Aps, Camtasia/Snapz Pro, Vista/Office 2007.

New Suggestions - Tech Literacy Assessment for 8th grade students, online courses (Moodle), State KANDIS Database

Topics were divided and left as the following:

February - (1) Tech Literacy Assessment for 8th Graders (2) Handhelds/iPods/Neos
- Handhelds / iPods / Neos will be presented by Charlie, Luke, and Bentley
- Everyone needs to come prepared with suggestions on how to address the 8th Grade Technology Assessment


March - (1) Online Courses with Moodle (2) Shared Spreadsheets and Writing Applications
- Online courses - Tonya
- Shared Spreadsheets & Writing Apps - Judy, John, Tonya

April - (1) Camtasia/Snapz Pro (2) Assistive Technology for students with special needs (3) Inspire Data Phone Demo
- Camtasia - Tom; Snapz Pro - Tammy
- Assistive Technology - Dwayne
- Inspire Data Phone Demo - Tammy will arrange

May - (1) Office 2007 and Windows Vista (2) GPS in the classroom extensions (3) State KANDIS database - could be moved again
- Office 2007 - Luke and Pete
- GPS extensions - Dyane, Rita, and Cindy

Sharing Time

John from USD 495 shared his new Help Desk software.

www.weatherbonk.com - A cross between the weather channel and Google maps. Check current weather conditions anywhere in the country or even on a driving route. This even shows school web cams.

NEW PROJECT - On January 29, 2007, Dan Buettner and his Blue Zones team will take students
and others on the latest Quest --- a three-week, inquiry-based, online,
adventure learning project in which participants play a critical role: they
are able to direct the research team, learn skills for healthy living and
possibly win some classroom cash awards.

You can watch a two-minute video about the Blue Zones programs at this link:
http://207.36.118.227/BlueZones/index.html

www.efieldtrips.org - Take an electronic field trip with your students for free. You'll need to register your class to be a part.

www.papertoys.com - Download and print some wonderful paper folding structures to use in your classroom.

www.seatguru.com - Discover all the ins and outs of any commercial aircraft - where are the electrical ports? How much leg room?

www.snowflakebentley.com - Goes along with a Caldecott winning book The Snowflake Man - the first man to photograph a snowflake.

http://snowflakes.barkleyus.com - Create your own paper snowflake on the web and save them in a gallery

www.oncotton.co.uk/peter - Paper art construction

www.bubblesnaps.com - Allows you to place FLASH bubble captions on a digital photo.

www.bubbleshare.com - Another customizable digital photo site that allows voiceovers
http://t4.jordan.k12.ut.us/grade_level/index.html - Tech Integration links by standard

http://kiddierecords.com/ - Download children's audio stories from old LP records
Kiddie Records Weekly is a three year project celebrating the golden age of children's records. This brief but prolific period spanned from the mid forties through the early fifties, producing a wealth of all-time classics. Many of these recordings were extravagant Hollywood productions on major record labels and featured big time celebrities and composers.
http://www2.sherston.com/freebees/ict.htm - Free Interactives from the UK for Interactive White Boards

http://grant.robinson.name/projects/guess-the-google/ - Can you guess what someone was looking for on the web through these images?

http://grant.robinson.name/projects/montage-a-google/ - Create your own montage!

Diane shared new activities added 1/5 for Smartboard
http://www.education.smarttech.com/ste/en-US/Ed+Resource/Lesson+activities/Notebook+activities/Browse+Notebook/United+States/

http://wordcountjournal.com - Online journal that counts words. Set up free accounts for class or for individual students.

http://www.visual-literacy.org/periodic_table/periodic_table.html - Listing / categorization of graphic organizers.

http://www.learner.org/north/mclass/ - Great activity to use with GPS systems

http://www.newton.k12.ks.us/sch/w/start/geo/index.htm - Travel Bug

Stumble - extension of Firefox:
http://www.mozilla.com/ : download the Stumble extension - click the "stumble" button and it displays a random site based on your interests

Cool Iris - Firefox add on: https://addons.mozilla.org/firefox/2207/